hummus king: vegan paradise in the valley

ever since we posted brittany’s glowing review of hummus king, an all vegetarian restaurant in valley village, we have been dying to go there. we finally made the trip this weekend, and i can safely say that it’s one of my new favorite spots.

the menu at hummus king is large, inexpensive, and almost entirely vegan (i think the only animal products at the restaurant are eggs as a topping). they’ve got several platters, salads, and sandwiches filled with your choice of homemade falafel, spiced vegan shwarama, and SEVEN different kinds of hummus to choose from. the second we walked in, a friendly fellow behind the counter started whipping out spoons filled with hummus, offering us a chance to try each flavor. they were all super tasty; i knew immediately that we were in for an awesome meal.

we decided to share the falafel platter, which isn’t a platter at all, but rather several small plates of food. this would probably be enough to feed 2 people, or one VERY hungry person. our platter came with 8 falafel balls (a mix of normal and fire flavor), a side of salad, a side of shwarama, a side jalapeno hummus, 2 pieces of pita bread, and fountain drink.

lemme start by saying the falafel was FANTASTIC! some of the best i’ve ever had. super fluffy in the middle and crispy on the outside, yet not burnt to a crisp. it wasn’t overly oily, and it was perfectly seasoned. i highly recommend doing what we did and asking them to throw some “fire balls” (spicy falafel) into the mix, because those were even better than the normal falafel.

the side of shwarama that came with the falafel platter was huge, i couldn’t believe it was just a side when they brought it to our table. one bite of this stuff and i was in love—thinly sliced and super meaty, it was all mixed up with fantastic mediterranean spices and little bits of grilled onions. i’m definitely gonna work this shwarama into my order every time i go to hummus king.

the salad was very nice as well, light and refreshing with crispy cubes of cucumber, plump tomatoes, and shredded cabbage. it went great stuffed on top of the falafel in the warm pita bread.

the last component of the falafel platter, the small side of hummus, was probably my favorite thing on the table. there were so many flavors to choose from, but we went with jalapeno and were not disappointed. this was some of the creamiest, most flavorful hummus i’ve ever tasted and it was finished off with a chunky scoop of chickpeas and some spiced oil. TO DIE FOR. i honestly wanted to pick up the plate and face palm it.

the falafel platter was so good, i would highly recommend it! i mean just look at the four pictures above—all that food for under 10 bucks! and you can’t even see the pita bread!

oh, but that’s not all my friends. not knowing how epic the falafel platter would be, we also got a shwarama sandwich to share. this was a very generous portion of the same tasty fake meat described above, shoved into a soft pita picket with salad, hummus, and green tahini. i would order this hefty hand held meal again any time, it was wonderful! it was all the deliciousness of the shwarama, salad, and hummus i described above neatly tucked together in an easy to eat sandwich. if i were at hummus king on my own for lunch, this would be my go to meal. it’s the right size for one person without having any leftovers.

our first experience at hummus king was phenomenal, and just thinking about it makes me want to drive over there right now. the place is pretty basic on the inside (as you can see in the picture above), but the food is out of this world. plus, the service is friendly, the prices are low, and you can sample pretty much anything you want before you order. oh, and it’s kosher!

get over to the valley and show this vegetarian business some support! you will thank me later.

Oh my lord, that looks so good. I love falafel. My favorite place for falafel is on Santa Monica & Normandie, Alex Falafel I think. They serve meat dishes, so I might have a new favorite falafel place to replace it with!

Since the Hummus King was first reviewed on QG my wife and I have been there 6-7 times. In fact yesterday waiting for the plumber to replace out hot water heater, my wife went and picked us up lunch there. We both had the shwarama sandwich, cabbage salad and fire balls.

Hummus King has turned into our new local favorite….and I love we can walk there in less then ten minutes.

I’ve gotta go again and try the fire balls…he was all out of them last time I went.

My one suggestion for Hummus King is to get iced tea. I bought a combo (assuming there would be iced tea) …but he only had soda and I generally don’t drink it. It was still cheap enough that I didn’t bitch about it…plus he gave me so many samples I felt like I had a free extra meal! 🙂

My veggie co-worker and I are constantly trying to expand our valley lunch options so I was psyched to try this place. We went on Monday and the shwarama sandwich ROCKED! This will now be on our weekly rotation.

Agree with Greg C. – I got the combo and was bummed by the lack of iced tea too.

The shawerma looks / tastes / feels to me like garden variety dried soy meat – essentially TVP. Has a mild, but distinctive taste which I don’t really prefer, and I thought the seasoning was a little not that great. I think if it were served hotter, it would have tasted a little better, but I really would have preferred a seitan-based shawerma, with more nuanced spicing. So it’s cool that they have it and all, and I was curious enough to make the trip for it once, but I’d really prefer to eat a good falafel somewhere else.

The falafel was Ok. Not the worst I’ve ever tasted as someone said above, but not really worth a trip to the valley for either.

Hummus was pretty good; the ful mudammes was really awful, though – didn’t taste like any rendition of ful I’ve ever had. It tasted more like pinto or kidney beans than fava beans, and the spicing was all wrong.

I’ve gone once and the shwarma was really good, though it wasn’t as seasoned as I’d hoped. I little tapatio saved the day. However, I’ve gone by 3 other times in September and they’ve been closed every time! Not sure if observance of Jewish holidays / sabbath is the reason, but I’m losing hope.

WOW, I have never been into hummus but had to because a friend wanted to. My was I in for a treat. This product is amazing, healthy, choices. What more could you ask for for an amazing meal. Ricco Ross